Comments on: RAYS 5, Jays 3: Just what the “Doc”-tor ordered

By: Sean

Sean — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 17:10:04 +0000

How are you going to compare Arod and Carlos Pena?

By: Scott Caruso

Scott Caruso — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 16:43:58 +0000

I like Alvarez. I think he’ll be a very good big league player. And I want to avoid him because of his signability issues.

By: Eric SanInocencio

Eric SanInocencio — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 16:25:17 +0000

Does Pena’s slow start possibly change the thinking for who will be the Rays selection as the top pick of the draft? If Pena is still struggling come July (or not putting up the same great numbers he did in 2007), does it mean Pedro Alvarez is back in play?

One of the reasons Alvarez as the top pick was kind of shelved was due to the emergence of Pena at 1st. People felt the clog of Longoria/Pena would have relagated Alavarez to DH status. But does that change if Pena doesn’t get back to last year’s numbers, his new contract not withstanding?

By: Scott Caruso

Scott Caruso — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 16:17:03 +0000

Richard, that’s not a fair comparison. A-Rod has consistently had elite production for over a decade. Carlos Pena has had only one good season in his entire career.

That said, like I mentioned earlier, I don’t think Pena’s a fluke. I think it’s just a bad slump.

By: Richard

Richard — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 15:51:09 +0000

Is A Rod a fluke, his numvers are down too.

By: Hazleton Jason

Hazleton Jason — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 14:43:46 +0000

It just seems from the eye test that Pena has been trying to yank everything, and last year he used left center and dead center quite a bit. Ever since the Yankees series, when the yanks played that EXTREME shift he has not seemed comfortable up there. He faked a few bunts, which makes me think it was in his head some.

He will be ok, but he is and will be more of a .250 hitter…

By: bobr

bobr — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 13:01:45 +0000

I think the only part of his game last year that might have been a fluke was the BA which was about 40 points higher than expected. Although he may not walk quite as much (which may have also resulted from his dangerous hitting last year) or hit 40+ home runs, he has always walked a lot and always hit home runs at a good rate. So while he may not match last year (I think he still can because the story is he altered his approach some which might account for the breakout season), he should remain a valuable hitter.

There is also some story that in his early years he was considered a hard-head which is why he rarely got a chance at full time duty and was prone to long slumps. That no longer seems to be an issue.

By: Scott Caruso

Scott Caruso — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 12:56:56 +0000

I’m not ready to call last year a fluke, yet, but his early-season trend this year is quite frightening.

By: Sean

Sean — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 12:45:23 +0000

Could Pena just have been a fluke last year?

By: Scott Caruso

Scott Caruso — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 05:15:13 +0000

Rather than calculate them myself, I got the standings off of ESPN.com. The Pythagorean (Expected) Standings are defined as:

“The Pythagorean formula is a sabermetrics formula devised by Bill James that aims to assess actual team quality.

In its simplest form, the Pythagorean formula states that if a team scores “RS” runs and allows “RA” runs, it has the following “Pythagorean” winning percentage:

PWP% = RS^2 / (RS^2 + RA^2)

Multiply this value by 162 (or whatever number of games have been played), and you have an “expected” win total that can be compared to a team’s actual win total.”

It’s been around for quite some time now and is a very crude way of figuring out how many games a team “should” win.